diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 2ba872079..bd4d99055 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 .cask/
 eshell/
 private/cache/
+private/snippets/
 var/
 core/autoloads.el
 .mc-lists.el
diff --git a/.gitmodules b/.gitmodules
deleted file mode 100644
index 1bc5d2f21..000000000
--- a/.gitmodules
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,3 +0,0 @@
-[submodule "private/snippets"]
-	path = private/snippets
-	url = git://github.com/hlissner/emacs-snippets.git
diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index a7ea6af57..a4e511ebf 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -13,6 +13,9 @@ update: autoloads
 
 clean: clean-files clean-elc
 
+snippets:
+	[ -d private/snippets ] || git clone https://github.com/hlissner/emacs-snippets private/snippets
+
 autoloads:
 	@echo "Generating autoloads"
 	@$(EMACS) --script scripts/generate-autoloads.el 2>&1 | sed 's/^/  /'
diff --git a/private/snippets b/private/snippets
deleted file mode 160000
index 9672e7741..000000000
--- a/private/snippets
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-Subproject commit 9672e7741e3303449c0a7167a1ccf87b96cd67e0